Let’s get the obvious out of the way: respec to Assassination. Patch 3.3 has buffed damage output from that tree so much that Combat doesn’t even stand a chance. I no longer have the data from Recount with me but here’s what drove the proverbial nail in the coffin when I was thinking about the numbers a few days ago.

I noticed the damage increase in Icecrown Citadel. There were two rogues in the group and we were just leaving everyone behind in DPS. No one else was even close. To verify this, I decided to use it on a fight where Assassination is at a disadvantage: Anub’Arak. We usually position the adds next to Anub so melee can AoE/cleave them. It makes sense for me to run Combat during that fight so I can use Blade Flurry + Adrenaline Rush. I was clearly in the lead of the other rogue in the group until we got Anub down to 30%. When he started leeching life from everyone, I had no more adds to buff my damage so it became a single-target race in terms of DPS. Guess what? The other rogue caught up and beat me.

So that’s it. Run Mutilate/Assassination. Don’t believe me? Check out the updated Q&A at EJ.

I expect Blizz to swing the nerf bat pretty hard on this one, so enjoy it while it lasts.

I’m lagging behind my guildmates on the DPS race due to my pathetic gear. I missed out on an instance marathon due to work and I’m now paying the consequences for trying to live a life outside of WoW. Yes, yes, I know. The whining and dining will stop there.

I’ve been looking at other builds for my rogue recently because Hunger for Blood is a bitch to maintain. There, I said it. Assassination is a tree that will keep you awake during raids due to the fact that its rotations are more complicated than Combat. I tried creating a dagger-based build for the truly lazy and came up with something focused on Sinister Strike. Now, I know that Backstab is supposed to be the attack skill of choice for Combat Daggers, but I did say “truly lazy”, right?. I keep hearing that ‘Sin (my shortcut for Assassination) specs have the best DPS output, but its learning curve is definitely a rude awakening for those who aren’t used to it.

There are two things that are preventing me from actually doing a respec: Mutilate and crits. Mutilate is well worth the talent-point investment and should be the only choice for Rogues who prefer using daggers. ‘Sin’s critical hits are just plain addictive to see. You’ll want to get an addon that will make your crits more obvious like SCT or MSBT that changes the fonts or Comix that plays sounds. They’re only aesthetic changes, but ones that you’ll learn to appreciate.

I don’t like daggers.

There, I said it, and I’m only saying it because I want you guys to understand how difficult it was for me to switch. Do you know the irony of making the decision to use daggers and then have this thing drop the next day? My bad luck with dice rolls is crossing over to my drops.

Anyway, this post isn’t about liking or hating daggers. It’s about the current Assassination tree and what you can expect from it. This is purely from a PvE perspective, so let’s get that out of the way while we’re at it.

Like I keep saying, going from Combat to Assassination means giving up swords and replacing them with daggers. Mutilate requires you to have two daggers, so you won’t be doing the sword-fist-dagger combination that Combat allows. Be prepared to wield one weapon type only. I know it’s redundant at this point but I’m really struggling with the aesthetics involved. With Mongoose, my weapons look like electric grow sticks.

Fighting becomes a one-on-one affair. Thanks to Combat talents, it was easy to hit Evasion, aggro four to five mobs, hit Blade Flurry followed by Killing Spree and then watch all of them drop before KS ends. You lose the multi-mob killing with Assassination, but don’t worry, it’s offset by the next item.

Expect shorter fights. I’m talking 6- to 7-second encounters here. If you’re lucky, mobs will drop quicker than you can stealth back in. You can even use your stealth cooldown as a of sorts. If you can kill a level 70 mob before you can re-stealth, you know you’re doing good.

Crits, crits, crits. This is the most obvious, if not the biggest, benefit that you can get out of the tree. You should see crazy numbers out of the build so turn on floating combat text (or even better, get a combat addon) and compare. Not only should you be getting more crits, they should also surpass your old crits from Combat. The downside is that you also generate more threat, so you may want to hold off on attacking too early during raids.

That’s it so far. Hopefully I’ll hit 80 before next week.

As I mentioned in my previous post, I respecced my rogue from combat to assassination. This is because of several blogs, posts and other information on the Web that say that the tree is not only a viable option for raiding, it’s also a lot more fun. I would’ve switched to it earlier had it not been for the fact that I didn’t have any purple daggers. I finally gave in to my curiosity and respecced, buying the SSO daggers as temporary weapons. I then proceeded to do the dailies to check my performance with the build.

Here’s the verdict: I’m not going back.

Now, don’t get me wrong. I’m not saying that assassination is better than combat. Based on what I read, both are good specs for raiding. It’s simply a matter of preference and I have to say that I really like assassination at this point. Note that this is coming from someone who prefers swords over daggers, so I didn’t go into this with high expectations. I just wanted to see what the fuss was about.

So, comparisons. I think I’m going to have to write about the details in a separate post. The short version is that DPS in assassination is a bit harder because I have to maintain Hunger For Blood. By maintain, I mean I have to make sure it’s always stacked at the maximum (3) and then I have to remember to keep it up. The second thing that makes it tougher is the skill rotation. Mutilate is expensive at 60 energy. I have to keep Slice and Dice up while using Mutilate to acquire combo points. I already mentioned that I have to maintain Hunger For Blood too, right? I see this as a temporary problem that I have to overcome. Right now, I think I just need to find the right groove.